bioRxiv vs Elicit

bioRxiv is a free online archive and distribution service for unpublished life-sciences preprints. Researchers can post findings for immediate availability and receive feedback before journal submission. It accepts research across areas such as genetics, neuroscience, ecology, and bioinformatics. Before posting, submissions receive completeness and scope checks, automated analyses for possible plagiarism or prior online posting, and review by volunteer Affiliates for biological relevance and potential public harm. Screening usually takes 24–48 hours, with longer waits possible during weekends, holidays, or further discussion. Articles are not peer-reviewed, edited, or typeset before posting, and publication does not endorse scientific quality. Research articles must contain data; narrative reviews, commentaries, opinion pieces, and step-by-step protocols are not accepted. Authors may revise until formal journal acceptance, but posted articles cannot be removed. The service provides public comments, B2J journal transfer, APIs, RSS metadata, and bulk full text for text and data mining.

Elicit is an AI research assistant for researchers gathering and assessing evidence. Its Research Agent draws on scientific databases, academic journals, public data sources, uploaded documents, a corpus of 138 million academic papers, and the wider web. A session can use up to 20 uploaded resources, including PDF, DOCX, XLSX, PPTX, and JPG files. Elicit offers Research Agent sessions, Research Reports, and Systematic Reviews, and supports AI-generated claims with sentence-level citations to underlying sources. It can find up to 1,000 relevant papers and analyze up to 20,000 data points at once. Research Reports export as PDF or Word, tables as CSV or Excel, and references as RIS or BIB. Elicit runs on the web and provides an API, but API access requires Pro or above. Its MCP server connects to Claude Desktop, Claude Code, and other compatible clients using OAuth 2.0. Basic is free with limited usage for Research Agent and Research Reports; Plus costs $11 a month. Pro is $39 a month and Scale is $89 a month. Elicit states that it has achieved SOC 2 Type II compliance.